Giveaway: Inside Apple: New book aims to expose old secrets

Inside Apple is a new book from Adam Lashinsky that aims to reveal some of the secrets behind the success of America's premiere consumer electronics company -- Apple. Lashinsky wasn't given the access that Walter Issacson was given for the Steve Jobs biography, but he did lots of interviews and paints a compelling portrait of one of the most secret companies in recent history. How much of the Apple magic he ultimate manages to expose is anyone's guess, but for Apple enthusiasts and business students alike, it certainly looks like a must read.

Check out the full description -- and giveaway! -- after the break, and pre-order now to avoid the virtual rush. (We'll also be discussing this in the iMore book club, so head on over!)

INSIDE APPLE reveals the secret systems, tactics and leadership strategies that allowed Steve Jobs and his company to churn out hit after hit and inspire a cult-like following for its products.

If Apple is Silicon Valley's answer to Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory, then author Adam Lashinsky provides readers with a golden ticket to step inside. In this primer on leadership and innovation, the author will introduce readers to concepts like the "DRI" (Apple's practice of assigning a Directly Responsible Individual to every task) and the Top 100 (an annual ritual in which 100 up-and-coming executives are tapped a la Skull & Bones for a secret retreat with company founder Steve Jobs).

Based on numerous interviews, the book offers exclusive new information about how Apple innovates, deals with its suppliers and is handling the transition into the Post Jobs Era. Lashinsky, a Senior Editor at Large for Fortune, knows the subject cold: In a 2008 cover story for the magazine entitled The Genius Behind Steve: Could Operations Whiz Tim Cook Run The Company Someday he predicted that Tim Cook, then an unknown, would eventually succeed Steve Jobs as CEO.

While Inside Apple is ostensibly a deep dive into one, unique company (and its ecosystem of suppliers, investors, employees and competitors), the lessons about Jobs, leadership, product design and marketing are universal. They should appeal to anyone hoping to bring some of that Apple magic to their own company, career, or creative endeavor.

The Giveaway

Leave a comment below telling us what secret you'd most like to learn about Apple and you're automatically entered to win one of three (3) copies of Inside Apple, courtesy of your friends here at iMore! (Must have a U.S Apple Store account to redeem -- Apple's rule, not ours!). Contests starts now and ends Sunday, January 29 at midnight PST.

I want to know how far in the future the iphone "feature" pipeline is mapped out and how the complex product design and supplier capacity that goes into deciding when a feature is available. Just how do they get me to buy a new phone every year ... having just enough features to "need to buy it" yet not so much that they sacrifice next year's sales.

I'd love to know how far out they plan their stuff. Seems like rumors that come out are about 2 years ahead. Like the rumor of a 64 gig iPhone came out right before the 3GS, then 2 years later the 4S has it.

Many questions that I hope get answered. Apple and specially Steve Jobs real reactions to IPhone 4 left at a bar scandal. How many design alternatives to each product do they manage. Again we don't know how deep inside this book goes to but it would be a really interesting reading for anyone.

I'm interested in the development of the Newton, and why it was killed rather than improved since small handhelds did succeed (Palm) and what was going on behind the scenes as they came up with the concepts for the Touch and iPhone - like why they stayed out of the market till they knew they had a winner.

To be honest, Apple is pretty much my favourite company, its tactics, business model, train of thought and design elements all fall in line with my beliefs of what a proper company should strive to achieve in its existence. Just my honest opinion.
I would like to win a copy of such a insightful title, not for any one particular "secret" that I am hoping will shockingly be revealed in the book, but rather for it's new perspective into the workings of one of the greatest companies of our time.
P.S - I do have a 100% functional U.S App Store account.

Are Apple actively looking at the JailBreak developer community (I mean the guys writing the cool stuff, not the people who do the actual JBs, and maybe even engaging with them) and considering adding a lot of cool features from there any time soon and extending the APIs etc. so that people who JB for tweaks don't need to bother as they can get them officially.

The secret I wanna know is how many ppl apple has just to go after top of the line technology, to implement it on a phone. And if the whole company shares a commitment for Jobs vision or is just work for them?

I'd love to learn about how they decide whether a product will be released and then what happens to the product - Specifically those that are NOT released. Is there a vault with all of those failed ideas that those in the know can play with and try to bring back to life in a new and updated form?

I'd like to learn more about how Steve Jobs operated behind the scenes - how he motivated, innovated - and how he was able to inspire and develop such amazing products.
Thanks for the contest - hope to get a copy.
BB

I'm curious about anything going on inside Apple, really. One example is that I sometimes wonder how they decide when to discontinue including things like floppy drive, optical drives, etc. when other companies continue to carry along such legacies.

I would like to know how the passing of the Late Great Steve Jobs, Has truely impacted on the design Ideas of the company. Also would like to know how bad his Passing has affected the Research and Design teams for new products

I'd love a behind-the-scenes look at the security surrounding prototypes, as well as any info on whether or not they actually utilize fake devices to mask what's really being developed. Could be fun stuff!

I would want to understand more what type of market research the company does. I know they typically don't ask consumers what they want, but I figure there has to be some form of market research going on.

As a long time Apple fan, I'm very intrigued with the rumors about Apple coming out with a television with built-in iTV integration, and hopefully integration with iOS apps and maybe even Siri (although that alone is probably a long shot). And so I'd like to know Apple's secret with this new soon-to-be released technology!

I would like to learn where they keep their $96,000,000,000.00 cash so I can smash and grab 'em! Haha! Kidding aside, I would love to know how they create/test the prototypes for their future products. Thanks iMore!

I want to know how did he get all of us to do more then buy it, but how did he get us to keep wanting more of it making us alone without may I say the whole set. Like we can't just have a iPhone we get the iPod iPad Mac MacBook because it's a must. Or maybe I'm weird